Kelvin Benjamin had a strange first day of training camp with the Giants — he was cut before the end of practice. And now the veteran wide receiver-turned-tight end is blaming Giants coach Joe Judge for the way things played out.
“It was just like they were trying to sabotage me to get me out of there,” Benjamin told NJ Advance Media in a phone interview on Wednesday night.
Benjamin blasted Judge for the way things played out, calling his brief stint with the team “a hoax” and declaring Judge doesn’t have what it takes to ever lead the Giants to a championship.
“I just felt like from Day 1, once I stepped on the field, once I put on the colors, he never liked me,” Benjamin said. “He didn’t even want me there.”
A Giants spokesman declined to issue a statement in response to Benjamin’s comments. Earlier Wednesday, Judge did not address Benjamin’s release during his press conference because he spoke to reporters before practice.
Benjamin signed with the Giants in May after completing a rookie minicamp tryout, but said that general manager Dave Gettleman — who drafted him in the first round with the Carolina Panthers in 2014 — was the one who wanted him to join the team. Benjamin hadn’t played in the NFL since 2018 and hadn’t intended to return until Gettleman called him to try out.
The 30-year-old had exclusively played wide receiver before coming to the Giants, with stops playing for the Panthers, Bills and Chiefs. But he was trying to make the Giants at a new position — tight end.
“I don’t want to bash anyone, but I just felt like Joe has had it out to get me since I walked into that team building,” Benjamin said. “It never felt right. The guy never even had a conversation with me until the day they signed me.”
At the beginning of Wednesday’s practice, Benjamin jogged out for warm-ups, only for Judge to pull him aside. The two spoke for a few minutes. Eventually, Gettleman joined them. After the three men engaged in an animated discussion, Benjamin ripped off his helmet and left the field. He was cut a few hours later.
Here’s Benjamin’s side of the story:
Benjamin weighed 265 pounds at the end of minicamp in June and was told by Giants staff that he needed to get down to 251 pounds for training camp. Instead, he showed up weighing 268 after putting on some muscle, Benjamin said.
But Benjamin passed the Giants’ conditioning test Tuesday, he said. The test for a tight end consists of the player completing 20 50-yard dashes in under seven seconds. Benjamin said he completed those tests and didn’t hear anything about the Giants being unhappy with his weight.
So he ran out for practice on Wednesday, and Judge pulled him aside. They talked for a little bit and waited for Gettleman to come over.
Judge “was like: ‘We’re gonna fine you for being 17 pounds overweight.’ I was like: ‘How are you going to do that?’” Benjamin said. “I said: ‘So you want me to be a smaller tight end than when I played wide receiver.’ He had nothing to say. He quieted down.”
Benjamin said that Judge never told him Tuesday that he wouldn’t be able to practice Wednesday, so he assumed he was good to go.
“He didn’t even talk to me [Tuesday],” Benjamin said. “The day before practice, he didn’t bring all of this up. I just felt like the dude didn’t like me. Mr. Gettleman knew exactly what went down. Everybody in the building was telling me I looked great. I was feeling good. It’s crazy how they twisting the narrative about everything like it’s a joke. They make it seem like we don’t even matter. That’s the thing about humanity, man.”
Benjamin said Judge also told him that he purposefully didn’t practice at points during minicamp — a claim Benjamin denied to Judge. The second-year head coach told Benjamin this was his second strike and he had “one more chance.”
“I was like: ‘What do you want me to do?’” Benjamin said. “I’m like: ‘I’m trying everything I can to be here. You won’t even let me on the field to show what I can do. I played receiver at 268 [pounds] and I almost had 1,000 yards [in 2016]. So why do you want me to come back at 251 at tight end?’”
Benjamin also claimed he didn’t drop any passes in minicamp and felt like the Giants purposefully never highlighted that on social media.
“To be honest, man, I just felt like it was all a hoax,” Benjamin said of his brief time with the Giants. “I felt like they didn’t give me a chance. I finished the conditioning. I finished all of that. I did what I was supposed to do. Everybody in the building was telling me I looked great. They never wanted the narrative to be good about me.”
“Dave was the one that got me here — and Dave knew exactly what went down. I’m a team guy. I’ve been on a winning team before. I get the politics in the league and stuff. But the thing with me is: Don’t sit there and try to bash my game and let the story run wild. Just tell the truth. Be honest.”
Benjamin said the experience with the Giants soured his feelings about the NFL. He doesn’t intend to pursue any more opportunities in the league.
He plans to move back to Florida and “try and relax and just get back to living life. That’s the biggest reason why I walked away from football in the first place. A lot of it ain’t real. It ain’t real. It’s a lot of fake narratives. All I ever wanted to do was play football. I came from a small town not too many people make it out of. But everything is a joke now. Everybody is always funny. At some point, we have to grow up as humans.”
As for Judge, Benjamin doesn’t see him lasting long as a head coach in the NFL.
“I have a perspective on Joe Judge,” Benjamin said. “He’s not a coach that can ever win a Super Bowl because he sits there and cusses all day. You can tell he’s one-sided about everything. He’s a know-it-all. That’s not how it’s supposed to work. We all can learn from each other. We’re all humans at the end of the day. The true colors will come out.”
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